


What I'd Do If I Lost You

by emmalauren



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Avengers - Freeform, F/M, FitzSimmons - Freeform, Fluff, Multi, Skyeward - Freeform, everything, infinity war broke my soul
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-04-30 07:04:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14491452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmalauren/pseuds/emmalauren
Summary: Skye Johnson is left picking up the pieces after Thanos invades Earth, and then suddenly vanishes. But when she finds out the truth about the Avengers, there's only one person she can turn to.Michelle Jones has lost her best friend, and she isn't going to let that stand. So the smartest girl at Midtown School of Science is going to make a change.Sharon Carter is tired of being left behind by everyone she loves. She isn't going to let someone else go.Shuri is one of the smartest women in the world, but when the world is falling apart, she has no choice but to piece it back together.Peter Parker is left swimming in a nightmare after Thanos snaps his fingers and the world disappears. All he wants to do is go home.





	1. The World Without You In It

**Author's Note:**

> This does contain spoilers from Infinity War - be warned! I update every Monday afternoon (occasionally other times but always then).

Skye took a deep breath, pressing a hand against the cool marble counter. The safe house was designed to look like the perfect American suburb - with shuttered windows, a furry rug by the bathtub, and picture frames hanging from the walls. A few Skye recognized from Simmons' phone, others she had seen in the Framework. How SHIELD had gotten their hands on those, she had no idea. But the facade didn't matter - no one was going to see the grass, not 200 meters under the surface of the Earth. Protocol had been initiated to keep certain agents safe - not because they were a priority, and certainly not because they were Inhumans - Skye had been reminded of this several times. But because someone was going to have to clean up the mess when the war raging on the surface finally ceased. There had to be someone left to count the bodies. And of course, it had to be Skye. Fitzsimmons was in a bunker somewhere else, and Phil and May had vanished before Skye could even question if she was ever going to see them again. So, here she was, in her fake backyard, glaring up at the steel beams crisscrossing the space several meters above. The filtered air created a frigid zone Skye dared not cross. She had been told that the elevator would open when it was time. But it had been seven weeks. Seven weeks since she had gotten a phone call - because she did have phone service, as she had checked several times. Social media had shut down completely, and even her tentative tremors had revealed nothing. Her once strong connection with the demigod Thor had proved fruitless, and Skye was going out of her mind. At least that's what she told herself when she hacked the elevator system, grabbed her go bag, and waited. The elevator ride was over ten minutes long and insanely boring. While the elevator did come with a built-in shower and TV system, Skye hadn't bothered to set it up in her five-minute firewall fury, so even the lights flickered weakly. As she waited, Skye listed the Avengers in her head. Grant had always been much better at remembering the superheroes on call, but it was imperative Skye knew them all in case she was the one digging their graves. "Cap, Stark, Thor, Black Widow, Doctor Strange, Spidey, Maximoff, Hawkeye, Hulk, Falcon, Vision, Buck-o Barnes, Black Panther, Loki. If we can't find them, we activate Protocol 193, which should alert Agent Maria Hill, who can then issue a call to the next line of defense.” Grant's voice echoed in her head distantly, the same regimen he had drilled into her all those years. The elevator rattled ominously, before coming to a halt. Skye shot to her feet, fighting the urge to pace back and forth. Suddenly, the doors slid open with a rusty groan, affording Skye with her first glimpse of sunlight in almost two months. It was gloriously warm, and it would’ve made her feel a lot better if she wasn’t confronted with the sight in front of her. 

Washington D.C. had always been a city of beauty - the buildings centuries old, white columns and perfect symmetry. Everything was built like a perfect geometric equation. But even from here, at least a mile outside the city, Skye could see the smoke curling from the streets. Cars lay abandoned on the road, some with broken windshields, others perfectly intact. The old S.H.I.E.L.D. building lay in ruins, the steel structure the only thing left intact. Skye knew where she had to go - if anything went bad, she had to go to the Avengers headquarters. So with a quick look around her, Skye grabbed her bag and ran. 

It was easy to pilot the quinjet. After years with May, Skye could drive the thing with her eyes closed, and she knew the coordinates of the Avengers headquarters with only a moment of concentration. The flight was only forty-five minutes, and autopilot meant that she could slip into the shower and change, before stretching. No matter what was coming, stretching was probably a very good idea. Landing the quinjet was a little harder - the Avengers facility looked to be in perfect condition, but there was no one there to direct the plane to land, so she had to eye it and hope for the best. Exiting the plane and entering the facility was like being hit by a snowball - cold and unwelcome. It was abandoned, and quiet as hell. But Skye had training and superhuman senses, and she could feel the heartbeats through the floor. She counted three to her left, beating steadily and in almost perfect unison. Another went off erratically on her right, three beats and then four in quick succession. The three on her left were getting stronger, so Skye did the only thing she could think of. It took barely a blink in the direction to split the railing in half, a quick exhale to pull the jagged metal into her hand, and in a heartbeat, she’s holding the makeshift weapon to Grant Ward’s throat. 

“Skye-“ His words come out strangled, because, despite everything, Skye is losing control, and is most likely crushing his windpipe right now. Skye notices the movement out of the corner of her eye and sends a tremor through the ground, just enough to make the man on Ward’s right to stumble.  
“Don’t even think about it, Tic-Tac.” She hisses. The man widens his eyes.  
“How do you - wait, what?” He asks. Despite his cautious stance, his words are relatively light and unworried.  
“You’re Scott Lang, right? My bad - you like the name Ant-Man a little better.” Skye shifted her gaze to him momentarily before sliding her eyes to the man on Grant’s left. “And I’m assuming you’re Clint Barton. Considering that you’re not covered in that brown dust, I’m assuming that you’re families are still intact?” Skye asked. It was a priority for them, as she saw in their expressions.  
“For now, they’re safe, thanks to Wong over there.” Barton nodded to the space behind Skye, who glanced behind her to see the air shimmer and a man step out, clothed in dark robes, with glowing holographic bands casting a golden sheen on his wrists. It didn't take much for Skye to send out another tremor with a flick of her wrist, but the man just lets the wave roll over his head without pause. The rift behind him pulses an odd black-purple, before closing with a shower of orange-gold sparks. But while it should just bring the fourth heartbeat closer to her, bring it up the floor and into her bones, it becomes the fifth heartbeat. So, with a slight grunt and a crinkle of her nose, Skye dropped her hand, letting her homemade knife clatter to the floor. She shrugged off the slight flinch from Scott before turning. It went against every instinct in her body to turn away from anyone who looks like Grant Ward, but she had almost no choice as she slipped past the man named Wong and pulled the gun after the holster on her hip. The thick tactile gear of her jacket rubs against her fingertips, but she ignored it, instead of rounding the corner and pointing the Glock 22 at the girl in front of her. It takes a moment for Skye to even realize that it is a girl - her hair is pulled away from her face, but the expression she wears is one Skye recognizes intimately. It’s one of extreme annoyance and exasperation, cloaking the worry beneath all of that. It takes Skye at least ten seconds to react - a time she has had beat since three weeks into SHIELD training. But suddenly, Barton and Lang are at her back, Grant and Wong huddled in the middle of the room.  
“Who the hell are you, kid?” Scott asks, not without kindness. It’s a fair question - the Avengers facility isn’t a publicly disclosed location, and even if it was, the entire world is in panic mode. But instead of breaking down, the girl in front of them crosses her arms.  
“I have a science project. Where the hell is Peter Parker?”


	2. (I Can't) Let It Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michelle finally meets the Avengers and speaks her truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Infinity War broke my soul for a third time but I got a Spider-Man Funko Pop so it's cool. 
> 
> I post every Monday afternoon (and occasionally other times, but always then).

It’s second nature to lie through her teeth. Michelle doesn’t even think about it - doesn’t think about the fact that there are, in fact, two certified Avengers standing in front of her. All she knows is that these people can help and that Ned isn’t answering his phone, and the last time she checked, Peter Parker was swinging from a spider web from the side of their school bus on a trip back from MOMA. So she lies - watches the woman’s pretty eyes widen. Watches Ant-Man and Hawkeye glance at each other. Watches the Chinese man step through a pulsing space portal and vanish. Watches the white man in the middle of the room reach out to the woman, who flinches and moves away. Lets herself be led down hallway after hallway until she’s in a room that can almost be mistaken for normal. Michelle accepts the cup of tea with a slight smile - after all, her mother didn’t raise her like a monster. Her mother is okay - but most of her schoolmates haven’t shared the same fate. The entire Midtown campus is abandoned, backpacks lying untouched in the middle of the hallway. She tells herself repeatedly that the fact she doesn’t have anyone to turn to is what sends her upstate. In truth, it’s an obsession with planes since she was a little girl, extreme persuasion, and a giant helping of luck that she gets within a mile of the Avengers facility at all. And it’s with even more caution that she watches as Scott Lang and Clint Barton settle in around her. Clint, she can tell, is slightly more comfortable with teenagers. She remembers Peter saying something about Clint having a younger teenager. Thirteen, maybe fourteen if she had to push her memory. Scott isn’t necessarily uncomfortable, but watches her more - it’s a look she hasn’t seen in over eight years, but comforting nonetheless. The other two people in the room seem less concerned with her and more concerned with staying as far away from one another as possible. She hasn’t caught their names yet - but from the way they move, she can read the ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. without any difficulty. But still, it’s hard to be in the place she has heard Peter Parker rave about for the past seven months without him. It’s even harder because it doesn’t seem that the two men around her know what to do either.  
“Where’s Parker?” Michelle asks again. It isn’t because they weren’t listening - she knows they were. But she hasn’t gotten the answer she wants yet, and Michelle isn’t necessarily known for her tact.  
“We don’t know, Michelle. Scott’s been on house arrest for almost as long as I have. We haven’t been at the facility for over a year, let alone in contact with the team. But we do know the emergency protocol, and we know Tony. So what we need to do is activate Nat’s tracker, and we need to find her. It’s likely that Tony isn’t even in the Milky Way right now, so we’re going to deal with who’s on Earth before we try and recover anyone else. OK?” Clint’s voice is painfully strong - Michelle doesn’t want to be talking to someone who is immune to her needle jabs and quick wit, but she wants to be talking to someone whose first priority isn’t finding her best friend even less. And she gets it - they’re looking out for all their teammates, particularly the ones that they know better. The men sitting in front of her both sided with Captain America during the fight in Berlin, as Peter never fails to remind her. So when they locate Natasha Romanoff in Wakanda, Michelle feels her pain shift slightly. She feels guilty - her best friend is god knows where, but she’s with the Avengers. And to be honest, she would die for the King of Wakanda if prompted. T’Challa is a tall glass of milk and she is not afraid to say it. Maybe it’s why she doesn’t argue when she’s sitting in a jet a few hours later. So she contends to sit there, watching. It may be the only thing Michelle does, but she’s glad she does it as she watches the tall man who she now knows is called Grant brush his fingers against the SHIELD agent named Skye’s arm, who reacts as if she’s been burnt with scalding water. It’s an interesting development and one that’s cataloged somewhere in Michelle’s brain. And it’s useful three hours later, about an hour away from Wakanda, when Skye comes to sit next to her.  
“I’m sorry about your friend.” The woman’s voice is unbearably nice, and it makes Michelle cringe. She hates pity more than anything, even if it’s Peter the pity is for - the boy she’s become closer within the past two years than she is with her own family. It isn’t a relationship that she likes to define - it’s that anthem that loops in her head every time the morning light filtering through her bedroom window reveals Peter, sleeping peacefully next to her. The same loop that screams in her ears everytime Peter absentmindedly links their fingers together. When he brushes her hair back, or when she does the same and they end a little bit too close. So instead of thanking her, Michelle changes her approach, angles, and lets loose.  
“I’m sorry about your love life.” It might be snarky, but Michelle doesn’t particularly care. Skye looks slightly taken aback, but she lifts her chin.  
“I don’t want to call it that. He was the love of my life, but he was a meteor in my orbit. We were bound to crash at one point. Besides, every girl falls for the bad guys. It’s just my luck that my fatal flaw is that I can never stop protecting the people I love.” It’s not bitter, the words flowing out of Skye’s mouth, but her expression definitely is, so Michelle turns away, blowing a stray tendril of hair away out of habit and staring out of the window, all the meanwhile trying to ignore how loud her heart is screaming. 

The descent into Wakanda is anything but smooth - despite Skye’s protests, Clint claims he can pilot the plane, which means smoke is curling from at least one wing as they make their descent. It barely looks like a scratch in the paint compared to the devastation around them. There are a small group of people waiting for them nonetheless, and despite the situation, Michelle can’t help but geek out on several levels as Steve Rogers (captain freaking america!!) approaches the group, hugging both Clint and Scott before turning his attention to Skye and Grant, who are still trying to put an ocean’s worth of space between themselves. He doesn’t even bother to comment - there’s a cut on his brow that’s still healing, and he holds himself gingerly, but it doesn’t make his blue eyes any less piercing as he turns his gaze to Michelle.  
“Clint, why the hell is there a kid in this war zone? It took three hours for Nat to convince me that Shuri should be here, and she can hold her own in any situation. I don’t need a civilian here.” It’s almost a confirmation - that Peter decided to be really damn stupid and go into fucking space without Michelle, and she isn’t sure what hurts most, but then she is suddenly aware that Steve Rogers is talking to her. “Who are you?” He asks. Like every adult’s voice in the past forty-eight hours, it’s not unkind, but it’s strained, with the weight of a thousand worlds, so Michelle makes her answer as concise as possible.  
“My name is Michelle. Peter Parker is missing, and I do not intend on sitting by and letting him vanish out of my life. He’s already missed enough Decathlon practice for thirteen lifetimes.” She tries to ignore her voice crack at the end of her sentence, but it’s there and it’s really loud in the destruction of potentially the most technologically advanced city in this part of the galaxy. But it’s Steve’s response that’s ten times louder.  
“Michelle, Peter is gone.” And suddenly everything goes a little fuzzy.  
“What?” And suddenly, she’s on the floor. 

When she wakes up, there are at least four people hovering over her. It’s hard to sit up, and she can feel her head throbbing, but reality waits for no one, especially not a sixteen-year-old on a mission. A hand lands on her shoulder, utterly unwelcome and too strong, helping Michelle up no matter how much her facial expression makes it clear she hates it.  
“Easy there, young one.” The voice is accented but clear nonetheless, and despite everything, Michelle’s heart skips more than one beat as she turns to face a woman who she assumes belongs to the Dora Milaje, the elite guard of Wakanda. The room is filled with Avengers - all battle-weary and leaning on one another to avoid where the rubble is piled almost to the ceiling, but it is more than enough to overwhelm Michelle. She can’t help herself, she scrambles backward and is immediately reached out to by at least ten more hands. It’s almost more than she can bear, so Michelle tucks her head between her knees and breathes. She taught herself how to deal with panic attacks after Peter almost collapses in the hallway in a cold sweat only a couple weeks of the death after his girlfriend, Gwen Stacy. Michelle and Gwen hadn’t been close per say, but watching Peter collapse outside that warehouse had broken something inside Michelle irrevocably. It hurts even more as she hears Peter scream in his dreams about Gwen falling and it kills her. But it’s not something she should be thinking about now - especially not as her breathing speeds up even more. So she takes a couple struggling breaths, and then feels her heartbeat slow enough for her to be able to look up at the adults around her. She can count twelve humans, including the four she arrived with, and a raccoon standing up, forelegs crossed. It takes a whole minute before Michelle even begins to react, and when she does, it’s explosive. She whips around the room, starting at her left. It takes more effort than she cares to admit to stand, but she does it, and it’s worth it because the look in Thor’s eyes can almost qualify as terrified. “What the hell? You guys are all standing here moping, and my best friend is in fucking space - and you know what, I get it. You just fought a war because you’re the Avengers and that’s what you do, and apparently, you have GMO’s for pets now, but you aren’t allowed to sit on your asses and mope while the rest of the world mourns. You don’t get to rest because superheroes don’t lose, and they don’t say shit like ‘oh, we tried’. Bullshit, you did. Yeah, you fought hard and there’s fucking alien corpses everywhere and the ashes of the people we love if we look a little bit harder, but there is an entire universe out there, and the fact that half of the human population disintegrated means that either you get up and do something, or I will, and half of you already think I’m a half-assed airbrain. It will take me two seconds to prove you wrong, but if you listened to the teenager on your team, you might know that, because you are the ones who dragged him into this mess, so you are the ones who are getting him out!” Michelle doesn’t realize she’s screaming until she’s done, and staring down Captain America, who looks like he really wants to break something. So Michelle glances to her left and sees how the girl her age looks like she might cry, so Michelle swallows the same instinct and leaves. 

It takes exactly three minutes for Michelle to get to the edge of the dome, which sparks unhappily and stings her skin. She hisses, brushing her hair back in frustration. It’s a nervous gesture - normally when she does it, Peter grabs her wrists and does it himself, so her hair doesn’t tangle. But Peter isn’t there, so she just sits down against a tree trunk in utter silence. It takes four more minutes for someone to find her. She’s surprised to find that it’s Skye, the SHIELD agent from the plane. “We never got formally introduced. My name is Skye. I work for SHIELD, and I promise I’m not here to hurt you or abandon you.” The woman’s eyes are wide, and earnest. It’s a trait Michelle doesn’t see often, but when she does, it’s typically real.  
“My name is Michelle Jones. I am here to find my best friend. I’m not here to insult anyone or be anything but honest. And I’m sorry if that hurts someone, but I have hurt been in too much pain the last three days to really give a damn.” The silence around her is heavy after that, and Michelle has a tingling feeling creeping up her spine, but Skye breathes out a sigh.  
“And a damn you shouldn’t give. Let’s go, Spider-Girl. We have an Avenger to save.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, basically Michelle is my spirit animal. I'm trying to get these chapters longer, and I am trying to get them done as well as possible. This is my tribute to the ladies of Marvel, because I love them with all my heart and soul. This chapter went up a little early, but IT'S OKAY. Unfortunately, this means I will NOT be posting tomorrow but I will try and post an additional chapter sometime next week.
> 
> As always, I am @emma-laurennn on Tumblr so come find me with your thoughts, and all your opinions.


	3. (To Me) You Are Everything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and Sharon finally reunite, and she's a casual badass.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This does contain spoilers from Infinity War - be warned! I update every Monday afternoon (occasionally other times but always then).
> 
> I am so sorry for not updating last week, but two more updates coming at you this week (fingers crossed).
> 
> Also, I apologize for the weird formatting - it's just the way it copied from Google Docs, and no matter what I tried to do to fix it, it still looks kind of weird.

Sharon Carter is good at many things - watching her friends die is not one of them. She’s at a dinner in a fancy dress when her colleagues start to disintegrate, dusting her tiger shrimp in black ash. It leaves her the only person in the restaurant - so there’s no one to help her when the doors barricade her in. It’s New York City in crisis mode, protecting its citizens with the very same protocol she helped create. Her familiarity with it does nothing to help her escape, just traps her for three days, forcing her to thrive off of bottled water and steak she has to cook in the sink using just a lighter, some cooking oil, and gloves that look like they were made for disabling an atom bomb.

Three days in pitch black solitude doesn’t help her any further when seven aliens come bursting into the restaurant, allowing her the slightest sliver of light to illuminate their snarling faces, mutated and filled with rage. She fights hard - smashing plate after plate over elongated heads, stabbing and screaming, releasing a rage she didn’t even realize she possessed. It’s not enough - she’s wildly outnumbered and she’s losing energy by the time there’s three of them left. She hadn’t managed to find a change of clothes, so she’s still in her evening dress, which restricts her movements painfully and cinches her waist. Blood drips down her face, salty in her mouth. The pain is blinding, but she just grits her teeth and raises her fists. Before she can even move, there is a blinding light, and then the aliens are gone - lying crumpled on the ground, limbs bent at unnatural angles. It’s grotesque, and it leaves Sharon gasping for air - swiveling, she places her hands against the wall and breathes for a moment, squeezing her eyes shut as if it could do anything to block out the reality of the situation. After a brief moment, a noise cuts through the silence.

“Sharon.” The voice is deep and familiar - a Brooklyn accent hidden behind years of disuse. It’s a voice she hasn’t heard in over a year, so when she lifts her head, she steps back, not forward. The man in front of her is barely recognizable - his hair is longer, and he has a beard. The uniform he had worn with pride for years is darker - the white star emblazoned on the front is missing, ripped away to leave just a dark shadow as a painful reminder of what was. But despite everything, Steve Roger’s eyes are the same - and so is his smile. Sharon doesn’t scream, or slap him, no matter how much she wants to. She just sits on a dusty chair, motions for Steve to sit across from her, and waits. Steve sighs, curling his fingers before opening his mouth. “I’m sorry. I should’ve called.” He begins. Sharon rolls her eyes.

“Damn right you should have.” She’s not mad, per say, but she hadn’t heard anything from him in over a year. She had passed by worried several months ago.

“I’ve been all over the place. Sam, Nat, and I - we’ve been helping people where we can, but we’ve been on the run practically non-stop. I broke them all out of prison, so it’s safe to say Secretary Ross is still after all of our asses. I lost half the team when Clint and Scott had to go back to protect their families. I haven’t even been in North America for eight months.” Steve trailed off, raising his gaze to meet Sharon’s.

“And now? I saw the news, Steve. Tony’s missing - probably in another galaxy as we speak. I know about the attacks. I saw the people disintegrate.” She prompts, ever curious.

“I assumed as much. We fought as hard as we could in Wakanda, but it wasn’t enough - Bucky, Sam…” His voice breaks momentarily before clearing his throat. “They’re gone. All of them. We’d been picking up the pieces in Wakanda as well as we could - we don’t have enough firepower or physical strength to take down Thanos, but then Spider Man's friend showed up and gave us all a piece of her mind. Needless to say, she took us down a couple pegs. But no matter what she said, she was right. We need to get Tony and his child arachnid back, and I need your help to do it.” It’s such a matter of fact statement that it takes Sharon a moment to register it.

“Wait, why? I may be a SHIELD agent, but you have Romanoff for undercover and hand-to-hand, almost all of you can handle a quinjet, and considering half the world has disintegrated, I’m sure you can navigate around the Sokovia Accords.”

“True, but we don’t know how to handle people as well as you do. Even afterward, we’re going to need someone to be our go-between, and it would be best if it was someone not on the team but who was present with us at the time. We have two other agents with us, but I doubt either of them is very good at PR, especially considering one is an ‘enhanced individual.’” Steve makes air quotes with his fingers, eliciting a smile from Sharon - the first one he’s seen since he left her a year and a half ago. “What?” He demands, biting back a smile himself.

“Let’s go, Captain America. We’ve got work to do."

 

The flight to Wakanda almost isn’t long enough for Steve to brief her on everything - the blowout between him and Tony, Spider-Man and his science buddy, Michelle, and who the hell Thanos really is. There are also twenty minutes spent explaining how the rules of physics and medicine allow for there to be a walking, talking, pickpocketing raccoon to be a part of Avengers 3.0. It’s a lot to take in, but it’s a hell of a lot better than fighting aliens in black tie, so Sharon sits, listens, and learns. As they begin their descent, Sharon peers out the window. Trees dot a desiccated landscape, and a bright blue dome sparks faintly in the distance. Steve navigates the quinjet down with a few bumps - enough to make Sharon slide across the floor in an ungainly heap of limbs before clambering to her feet, brushing herself off.

“You know what we call that in New York?” She calls after Steve, who is forcing the cargo door open with his bare hands. “Unnecessary.”

Any further sarcastic comments fade from her tongue as the cargo door buckles, opening with a painful groan, revealing a wartorn Wakanda. Despite the destruction, it’s beautiful, with a mix of culture and technology that epitomizes in the massive black panther carved out of the mountainside above them. Steve comes to her shoulder, glancing up at the panther.

“Did Peggy ever take you ziplining over Victoria Falls?” The question is asked so casually it’s almost funny.

“Yes. She did. When I was fifteen. I almost had a heart attack - and she was almost seventy-two at the time. My uncle almost died laughing - but despite everything, I was quite good at it.” Sharon stares up the cliff, before glancing at the super soldier at her side. Before she can ask any further questions, he grabs her by the waist, smiles, and grabs onto a wire that had been invisible to Sharon until then. And just like that, they’re gone.

 

The room is massive - the thirteen people plus a raccoon shouldn’t even take up a seventh of the space, but yet they’re all huddled together, heads bent together as if they’re planning for some secret mission - which Sharon supposed they were. “Guys!” Steve calls from across the room. In unison, the eleven humans (and raccoon) swivel, taking in the newbie with cautious eyes. Sharon raises her hands in defense.

“Sharon Carter. I’m here to help.” It seems to be enough for the super crew in front of her, who relax slowly. Steve gives her a reassuring look, before introducing the crowd.

“Sharon, this is Thor, Rhodey, Clint, Nat, Scott, Okoye, Shuri, M’Baku, Bruce, Skye, Grant, Michelle, and Rocket.” Steve gestures at the raccoon last, who gives a noncommittal grunt and goes back to fiddling with a part on a machine gun. Sharon steps forward.

“OK. Steve briefed me on the situation, and before we do anything, I need people to get their game together. Thor, you and Rocket go see if you can find anything that can help us get off this Earth. I heard about the whole Bifrost thing, but I doubt it can get all of us there with everything we need, as well as provide us with shelter. We also have no idea where we’re going, and Thor, we don’t want to waste your energy. Rhodey, you, Clint, and Scott should go check out the quinjets and the damage to all of the equipment you guys have. I don’t know how many reparations we can make here, but we need to try our best. Steve, you go with them. Okoye, you and M’Baku should go check on your people - the ones who survived will be in need of guidance, and while you’re still here, I’m sure they would prefer if you provide it. Shuri, you, Michelle, and Bruce should work on the tech - I want to have it in the best condition possible considering we’re not going to be fighting on our home turf. While you’re at it, try and get the worldwide network up and running again - restart all satellites and start on cataloging who’s still here. We want to make sure we get everyone home safe. Nat, patrol if you can. See what’s out there. We’re too vulnerable right now to survive a surprise attack. Skye, Grant, come with me. We’ll meet back here in three hours.” The team seemed almost surprised at her orders, but did as they were told, Nat and Steve shooting Sharon grateful smiles as they did. The two agents in front of her approached hesitantly. “OK, before I say anything, what the hell is going on between you two? You - Grant, was it? You can’t seem to get close enough to her, and you - Skye - you can’t seem to get far enough away. I don’t know what happened between the two of you - and if I’m being honest, I don’t really care, but for the sake of this mission, you two need to figure it out. As of this moment, I am the highest ranking SHIELD agent who is operating - and yes, I know that Coulson is alive, but he’s off on Tahiti, so I’m left to deal with all this bullshit. I’m giving you thirty minutes to talk - and if necessary, punch it out - before I’m coming back here to brief you two. Get to it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO SHARON AND STEVE ARE REUNITED AND I DIDN'T DO IT THE WAY I WANTED TO BUT I HAD WRITERS BLOCK FOR THIRTEEN DAYS AND THEN FORCED MYSELF TO WRITE THIS IN TWENTY MINUTES AND IT'S OVER 1,500 WORDS BUT NEXT WEEK'S GOING TO BE A BIG ONE SO YEAH. 
> 
> also if you have questions I'm on Tumblr @emma-laurennn


	4. (I Won't Let) Your Words Hurt Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Skye and Ward finally sit down and have a heart to heart, and WE FIND PETER!!! Also, michelle and skye are the real brotp. I PROMISE I WILL DEVELOP THE MICHELLE/SHURI RELATIONSHIP NEXT CHAPTER.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This does contain spoilers from Infinity War - be warned! I update every other Monday afternoon (occasionally other times but always then).
> 
> I changed my updating schedule because I've been hectic but hopefully I'll keep this up. Once school breaks up in three weeks, I'll post more often.

Skye’s day had been very long - surfacing from an underground bunker, meeting a wizard, the Avengers, dealing with a very snarky teenage girl, meeting Agent 13, who was, perhaps, the most badass SHIELD agent of the last decade, and reuniting with the love of her life. It wasn’t as if Grant Ward wasn’t a complete asshole, because he definitely was, but Skye hadn’t seen him in almost three years. The Grant Ward she had known had become a mirage - a distant memory she took out on rainy days to treasure. She had learned to separate the good memories from bad on those types of days, and mix them right back up whenever she was confronted with his face again. But the Grant Ward sitting in front of her was different - different from the Ward she had respected and loved, the one she had hated and feared, and the one she had met in the Framework. This was an all different Grant Ward - an alien with a well-worn face. “Who are you?” Even her voice was tired, barely filling the small space.

“Skye…” His voice was the same as well, deep and tinged with exhaustion from long days. His eyes were still brown with flecks of liquid gold, holding the fire of ten thousand stars inside. But there were smile lines around his eyes and mouth, a quality that her Grant had never possessed. Skye had grown much closer with Thomas Ward, Grant’s younger brother, in the years since she had shot Grant three times in the stomach. The Grant that sat in front of her was the same Grant from his stories - the doting older brother forced into terrible situations by unfortunate circumstances.

“Who are you?” The words sounded almost broken, ragged and worn as they forced their way out from between her lips.

“I’m Grant Douglas Ward. I’m from a different timeline than the one you live in.” His statement was simple and matter-of-fact, it barely registered until he spoke again. “In my timeline, my brother Christian was killed, along with my parents, in a car accident. My younger brother, Thomas, my younger sister, Rose, and I were all taken in by the Palamas’s. I had a new baby sister and life was good. For a really long time. But then the Palamas’s were killed, and that was what drove me into law enforcement - or whatever you call being a SHIELD agent. It’s what led me to meet you.” It wasn't an unfamiliar spiel - the Framework Grant Ward had given her a similar run-around, and the knowledge that she was someone else entirely in this man’s eyes gave Skye an uncommonly strong desire to run. But the Grant Ward she had known had trained her better, so she straightened her spine and sighed.

“So, let me guess. We’re madly in love, live together, you’re going to propose soon enough, it’s really weird to see me like this because your Skye is nothing like me? Something along those lines?” Watching Grant’s face in the next few moments was like watching Ruby after she had been injected - the feeling of having her heart being ripped in two by someone’s hands was not an improper label.

“No. I- We kissed a couple times, but I was a jackass and not a fan of long-term commitment. It was my long-term commitment to the Palamas’s that got them killed. So I turned tail and fled for a few months, and now we’re just friends. But our timelines got merged somehow - I woke up in a cornfield in rural Missouri two weeks ago and it took me about four days to realize that this is not my timeline. As far as I can figure, my timeline has been destroyed. I don’t know about Thomas or Rose - I haven’t managed to find them so far, but in my timeline, the Avengers knew about Phil. They knew about our team, and we were close to them. That’s why I was in the facility. I met Clint and Scott there and somehow managed to convince them I wasn’t hostile. That’s when I found you. And look, I understand that you don’t trust me. My access code to SHIELD works here as well. I got into an abandoned office. I read my file. I know what I’ve done. You have every right not to trust me.” The look in his eyes was so sincere that Skye couldn’t find a single marker of a lie. She hadn’t found one with the Ward she had known either, but she had grown a lot in the past three years.

“Fine. Listen up, Seal Team 6. I need your help in this situation - so I am declaring a very uneasy truce. If you do anything to break said trust, I will have Hulk crush your lungs until there is nothing but a bloody pulp left. Do you understand me?” With a look as if he was trying to bite back a smile, Ward nodded. “Alright. Then we have a spider-boy to save.”

 

The room they were standing in could’ve classified as a cavern - the ceilings disappeared into shadows above their heads, the walls at least two hundred yards away from one another. In the middle of the space, a massive projection of the globe spun slowly, bright pinpricks of light shining from Wakanda. Other, ugly red lights, illuminated areas such as New York City. “The normal light shows the Avengers. The red shows the alien invaders. They’re thinning out significantly, but there’s still too many forces for us to take on our own. However, if we zoom out a little, we can see the bigger picture.” The princess Skye had come to know as Shuri made a quick pinching movement in the air in front of her. The hologram responded, shrinking so Earth fit in one hand. One more bright pinprick of light shone over a million light-years away, pale in comparison to the small sphere in front of them. Michelle paled slightly, which didn’t escape Skye’s notice, but the teenager quickly recovered.

“This can’t be everyone - half of the population in the entire universe disintegrated. There has to be some way to reverse that, right?” Skye demanded. She still had no idea if Fitzsimmons were even alive, let alone the rest of her team. She forbid her thoughts to wander, but she didn’t have that much control in such a space. It made her senses tingle, her awareness spread like a thin blanket instead of a shield. It was unnerving, but with a brief shake of her head, Skye focused herself again.

“Yes. According to Scott, there are multiple dimensions and realms. There is the quantum realm, which is a microscope universe that exists within atoms. It’s also known as the microverse. There is the mirror realm, where actions do not impact the human world. There is the dark dimension, but as far as I understand, that is the home of a greater evil than we may ever know. If the Earth population is there, we may never recover them.” At the look on Michelle’s face, Shuri hurried on. It was hard to remember that she was technically a queen now - with her brother gone, she was in charge of an entire country. She was also nineteen years old, and Skye could hear the internal struggle waging behind her quick tongue. “There is the dream dimension, the light dimension, the negative zone. There are also the realm of the beasts, realm of madness, realm of nothingness, and realm of the shadow queen, but all of those are similar to the dark dimension. We have very little hope of rescuing their souls if they are there. We also looked at the realm of the undying ones - but it exists behind what are best described as layers of the universe. We have no hope of reaching it without physically tearing through the fabric of not only space and time, but of reality.” Shuri trailed off, meeting Skye’s eyes almost reluctantly.

“And we don’t have the Infinity Stones, so we can’t do that.” The realization was slow, but monumental, making Skye’s knees buckle momentarily before she straightened herself again.

“But there’s one thing we didn’t count on.” The voice was new, and Skye swung around to face Scott Lang, who strode towards them with a determined look in his eye. “Realms, dimensions, zones, they can collide. The microverse exists within atoms, but coexists within the realm of reality. If the light dimension and the negative zone were to collide, they would create a paradox in which human life could exist. However, such collisions are temporarily. If my calculations are correct, which they are, we have three weeks at maximum before the paradox would become unstable, and split apart, splitting the cells of the human life existing in it as well. They will die if we don’t get there in time.” His words rang out in the silent room - Shuri turned immediately and began furiously typing into some piece of technology that looked far too expensive, while Michelle stood, shell-shocked. Grant made no sounds, just turned towards the man in front of him.

“Where exactly is there?”

 

There turned out to be exactly eleven thousand light years away from Earth. Rocket reassured them that they could get to such a destination with only two days of travel, but any form of spaceship they had were currently in a burning mass of metal. It was an impossible predicament, and one that drove Skye to the top of a hill in the middle of the Wakandan forest. She wasn’t the first one there - Michelle sat, with a sketchbook in her lap, observing quietly. “We’re going to get him back, you know.” Skye felt some reassurance in her own words, not daring to doubt the hope she projected. “Yes, but will we all come back with him?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I LOVED WRITING THIS SO MUCH BECAUSE I GOT TO ANALYZE AND BE SKYE AND UGHHHHHHH LIKE THE AMOUNT OF RESEARCH JUST APPEALED TO MY INNER NERD AND I CAN'T EVEN EXPLAIN!!
> 
> also if you have questions I'm on Tumblr @emma-laurennn


	5. (I Love) The Way You Break Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michelle and Cap have a h-to-h and we finally learn about Michelle and Peter's relationship. 
> 
> This chapter is kind of filler, but I really just wanted to post something and give some backstory. The next chapter might be filler too, but after that we'll really start getting into the nitty gritty SAVING PEOPLE. Also, if you don't like reading big blocks of text, this probably ain't the chapter for you. Because there are BIG blocks of text.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This does contain spoilers from Infinity War - be warned! I update every other Monday afternoon (occasionally other times but (almost) always then).
> 
> So.... haven't really posted. It's been a super hectic summer and I've been traveling, so really wanted to focus on my life for a while. Up in the woods for a couple days with very little to do, so here's a chapter! Will probably post a couple more times next week, and then maybe another wait (shorter this time, I promise) because school will start up again.

“No. It will never work.” The sentence wasn’t unfamiliar to Michelle - in fact, the adults around her had been repeating it for the better part of the day - but it still stung to hear, so she gritted her teeth and tried again. The tiny movements made the muscles in her fingers twinge, but Michelle had unparalleled focus, and so she simply adjusted the controls and proceeded. This time, sparks flew up around her, almost unbearably hot as they floated down to rest on her skin. With a huff of annoyance, Michelle released the controls, sitting back in the dented spaceship chair. It was cramped - enough to set Michelle breathing slightly heavier than normal. There was also the raccoon fur, which made her scrunch her nose up in order to prevent sneezing onto the open electrical panel in front of her. “Michelle.” The same voice cut through the space, this time more insistent. Michelle spun around, glaring at the man in front of her. 

“Look. I get that you have seven PHD’s or whatever, but I’m pretty sure that neither your fancy gamma ray bullshit or your angry chartreuse alter-ego are going to help me connect the wires on this one, okay? So, until you have smaller fingers and better eyesight than I do, back off, Banner.” It was harsh - much harsher than Michelle intended, especially considering the fact that she was obsessed with gamma ray study and its effect on subjects such as Bruce Banner. But she was tired, and it felt good to win something. It felt even better to be alone, and watch sparks float softly into the burning landscape. Her back ached, a consistent pain that had been there for longer than Michelle cared to admit. With a sigh and a quick dig of her fingernails into the soft flannel sleeve of her shirt, Michelle turned to the panel and began again. 

 

“Michelle. Can we talk?” The voice was deep, with a New York accent - almost like Peter’s - and filled with sincere concern that made Michelle flinch.

“Sure. Whatever you want, Captain.” The words rolled off Michelle’s tongue carelessly, with a targeted precision. Michelle watched in disappointment as they bounced off the super-soldier in front of her. 

“I need to know more about Peter. I know it’s a touchy subject for you, but the more we know about him, the more we can narrow down on our timeline and the likelihood of his survival.” It was factual, stated simply in a way that even Michelle could appreciate.

“Fine. Whatever. Peter got his powers on a trip to Oscorp - this supremacist tech company - when we were in eighth grade. He was bitten by a radioactive spider. It gave him powers; heightened strength, hyper-senses, crazy reflexes, accelerated healing, and washboard abs.” A ghost of a smile tugged at the corners of Michelle’s lips, making her take a breath before she continued. “In the beginning, Peter was out every night. He was determined to make a change. And he did - crime rate in Queens was way lower. He even participated in a few demonstrations. You had to admire his dedication. At first, his schoolwork didn’t even suffer. He was working twice as hard, and it seemed like he always had energy. At the beginning of freshman year, Tony Stark showed up at his doorstep. Told him you’d gone psycho. Off he went to Berlin, and came back with Tony’s number and a hell of a confidence boost. I have to say, whatever you said to him made an impact.” Michelle risked a glance up to see Steve nod at her, a clear signal for her to continue. “But then his schoolwork started slipping. He was consistently missing Decathalon practice, even though he had a massive crush on Liz, the captain. Before long, he got involved in something a lot bigger than he could handle. Hell, he held the Staten Island ferry together, and saved our Decathalon team from plummeting to their deaths from the top of the Washington Monument. That one I was there for, and he knows what he’s doing. But handling alien technology in the hands of greedy douchbags was a little out of his weight-class, especially considering the fact that Stark thought it was a good idea to take his suit away. And yeah, maybe it was a good lesson, but that was before he got a building dropped on him, and had to stop the bad guy in the middle of Coney Island in his pajamas and a pair of swimming goggles. And the bad guy? He was Liz’s dad - the girl Peter had a crush on. He found out right after he asked her to Homecoming. She said yes, and he was so heartbroken about it. We weren’t really friends then, but we had seen each other in detention a lot. There was something about him - a boy so incredibly broken that was so determined to fix everyone else - that just drew my attention. I think it drew everyone’s attention. You know, Stark offered to make him an Avenger, and he turned it down to be a ‘friendly neighborhood spiderman’? And he did all this while keeping his identity from everyone except Stark and his best friend, Ned.” Michelle was gaining confidence, her hands working now, her feet tapping anxiously on the steel plating she rested upon. 

“Michelle, if he kept his identity from everyone, how did you find out?” There was something in Captain America’s tone that almost resembled curiousity, almost stranger than seeing him in an all-black suit that looked like something straight out of a Bond movie. 

“Look, I’m observant. I could probably find Black Widow in a crowd if I looked hard enough, and I picked up on the fact that you’re badly injured long before you started limping. You seriously need to tell someone about that.” Michelle crossed her arms, silently daring the man in front of her to protest. 

“I’ll do that as soon as you stop deflecting, and tell me the story, Michelle.” 

“Fine. I guessed it on my own - I had a couple of run-ins with some sketchy people and he swept in to my rescue. He had the right height, build, and voice. His mysterious disappearances lined up with Spiderman’s heroic rescues perfectly, and occasionally, I spotted a glimpse of red fabric beneath his goofy science pun t-shirts. That, and those boys do not know how to whisper. Then, at the very beginning of sophmore year, a new girl started at Midtown. Her name was Gwen Stacey. She was gorgeous, insanely smart, and with a moral compass that could rival Ghandi’s. Peter was infatuated; and honestly, if I wasn’t busy that year, I would have made a move too.” At Cap’s look, Michelle continued. “What, never met someone bisexual before? Sorry, I forgot you’d been frozen for seventy years. You see, it’s when somebody likes-” 

“Michelle, I’ve met bisexual people before. I really don’t get how Peter’s girlfriend ties into this story.” 

“If you could shut up for long enough, I could tell you. Peter started dating Gwen in the middle of sophmore year. Told her about being Spiderman in the summer before junior year. And then right before junior year started, Gwen was kidnapped. It was standard - just something random, happened because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. And then somehow the kidnappers found out that she was Spiderman’s girlfriend. Took her up to the top of this abandoned warehouse and somehow contacted Peter. Told him that if he really cared about her, he would save her. Five minutes later, just as Peter showed up, they dropped her. Twelve stories. And Peter caught her, right before she hit the floor. She was already dead - heart attack on the way down. I had seen Peter leave his apartment in the suit, and followed him. Found him crying in an alley just before the police showed up. His mask was off, and he was cradling her. I got him out of there in time and watched him for a day. After that, we were just closer, I guess. I had seen him at his lowest, and I got him out of it. I started learning to deal with his panic attacks when he started to have them in the middle of the hallway. Then once while he was out on patrol. Eventually, we started waking up in the same bed.” Michelle glanced at Steve, who looked slightly more than horrified. “Don’t get your century-year-old knickers in a twist, Cap. It’s not like that. He knows how to talk to me, and we get each other. Both damaged beyond belief and both determined to make a change because of it. We’ve seen each other through a lot, and now it just feels right when he’s there. He lets me breathe easier, and he backs me off a lot of ledges - both metaphorical and real. Then, a week ago, there was a field-trip to MOMA. I’ve been a thousand times, and it was an elective trip, so I didn’t go. A bunch of kids didn’t, but Peter and Ned did. Peter jumped out of the window of the bus and then onto a spaceship. He called me, before he went - told me to tell his aunt that he was going to be okay. And then he was just gone.” Michelle blinked quickly, focusing on the bright overhead light to avoid looking at the man in front of her, whose blue eyes were filled with almost unbearable pity. 

“Michelle?”

“Yeah.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me, Cap. Just get Peter back. And Cap?”

“Yes, Michelle?”

“Call me MJ.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is ultimate hc but whatevs. YEAH SO GO MICHELLE! I know I promised to develop the MichellexShuri relationship but I decided to do that a lickle bit later in the story, where it might be a little more vital for them to bond - didn't want Michelle to pour her heart out to a total stranger, so went with Cap???? um yeah this is kind of a crappy chapter but I POSTED so yeah. ANOTHER CHAPTER TOMORROW! 
> 
> also if you have questions I'm on Tumblr @emma-laurennn

**Author's Note:**

> SO MICHELLE AND PETER AND SKYE AND GRANT (WHICH I NEED TO FIX AHAHAHA) AND SHARON AND STEVE THIS IS GOING TO BE FUN FAM! 
> 
> also if you have questions I'm on Tumblr @emma-laurennn


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